Usual Way/Better Way: Post-Race Recovery

Goal: Recover quickly from your morning road race

Have some sport drink or other easily tolerated source of calories before starting a cool-down jog.

Grab whatever food and drink the race has provided.

After cooling down, refuel further with food and drink you brought to the race.

Drive home and assume that it's inevitable to feel creaky the rest of the day.

Do some gentle stretching before and after driving home. Later that day do a light aerobic workout, followed by more stretching.

WHY: The need to tend to your body during the recovery window – the first 30 to 60 minutes following a hard effort, when your muscles are most receptive to refueling and other ministrations – is even greater after a race than a workout or long run. Yet even many runners who are diligent about discipline in the immediate aftermath of a hard training session go all lackadaisical as soon as they finish a race. By getting your body back to its pre-race state as soon as possible, and then giving it a little more loving attention later in the day, you'll recover from the race quicker and be ready for more hard training that much sooner.

HOW: As soon as possible after finishing, start rehydrating. Before heading out on your cool-down jog, take in some easily digested calories. Muscles restock their glycogen stores at three times their normal rate in the first 30 minutes after a workout. Even in races where glycogen depletion is never an issue, such as a 10K, you'll have burned through a lot of your glycogen stores because you'll have run at such a high intensity. Quick refueling will prevent that sagging-energy feeling later in the day and will help your legs feel more lively on the next day's run.

Before you head home, refuel again with items such as fruit, bagels and sport bars that you brought with you. Don't leave something as important as post-race refueling to the whims of the race organizing committee, which likely offers whatever food it could get donated.

Stretch before and after your trip home to counteract some of the tightness that travel induces in most runners. If your race was 10 miles or shorter and you're used to at least an occasional double, do a short (15 to 30 minutes) gentle jog that afternoon. This short jog will increase blood flow to help hasten the removal of waste products from your muscles. If you're not used to doubling, or if your race was long enough to leave you so depleted that you won't be able to jog with normal form, go for a walk, swim or bike ride, or do some other form of gentle aerobic exercise that will get your heart rate up enough to increase blood flow.